Wairarapa call on McKenzie

Eketahuna halfback Hamish McKenzie has been brought into the Wairarapa-Bush squad for their NPC third division rugby match with King Country at Te Kuiti on Saturday.
McKenzie was a regular in the Wairarapa-Bush side throughout last season when they finished runners-up to Poverty Bay in the third division series but was undecided over his availability for representative play in 2005 and, consequently, has played little part thus far in this season's campaign.
However, a couple of good hit-outs for the Wairarapa-Bush B's has led to a change of heart from both McKenzie and coach Peter Russell and he has replaced Charlie Bargh in the squad for the King Country game, and possibly for the following NPC games as well.
Russell said the move to swap Bargh for McKenzie was one of the harder selection decisions he has had to make.
He was more than happy with Bargh's performance off the bench in Wairarapa-Bush's 50-3 thumping of Horowhenua-Kapiti last weekend and it was only his similarity in style with current first choice halfback James Bruce which counted against him
"He (Bargh) has done everything expected of him and he certainly hasn't been dropped though any lack of form," Russell said."But there are advantages in having two halfbacks with different styles of play and he (McKenzie) will give us that.."
Russell has watched video coverage of King Country's first two NPC games this season -games which produced a narrow loss to Horowhenua-Kapiti and an equally narrow win over South Canterbury- and has little doubt they will take a somewhat conservative approach against his team.
"It's obvious they back their forwards to dominate the opposition and we have to be ready for that," he said. "The focus of the inside backs is mainly on keeping their forwards on the front foot, they'd don't do anything too flashy."
That being the case the Wairarapa-Bush forwards will have to be on their guard, particularly at the ruck and maul, an area from which defensive deficiencies were exposed whenever Horowhenua-Kapiti utilised the pick and go tactic last weekend.
Former All Black Brent Anderson- a grand performer himself for Wairarapa-Bush through the 1980's- was at the Wairarapa-Bush training session on Tuesday evening where the concentration was on enhancing the defensive strategies in that area.
"We need to be a lot quicker in forming our defence and a lot more assertive when we go in for the tackle," Russell said. "If you allow the opposition to get a roll on they
can be very hard to stop."
The Wairarapa-Bush tactics on Saturday will, not surprisingly, differ little from that which produced such a stunning result against Horowhenua-Kapiti.
The initial emphasis will be on least gaining parity, if not control, in the forward exchanges and then they will look to utilise the pace of their outside backs, who could well be the most dangerous attacking unit in all of third division this season "What we have to watch is that we don't try to move the ball too early, that we stay composed and patient and wait for the right time for the backs to impose their skills on the game," Russell said.
The Wairarapa-Bush coach is confident his side won't be complacent after last Saturday's big win, saying that edited video coverage of that game clearly showed there was still plenty of improvement to be made before they could claim to be playing to their full potential..
"Everybody still has their feet on the ground, it's too early to get too cocky about anything yet," he said.